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| CBC photo of child known as S.S. |
This is a highly emotional custody battle.
It's playing out in a B.C. Court. The B.C. Ministry of Children have decided to
remove a happy Metis
toddler from her Metis foster parents who reside on Vancouver Island and
relocate her to Ontario to the non Metis couple who are raising the girl's
siblings. This two year old has never met her siblings and her biological
parents who wish to continue contact also reside on Vancouver Island. Her birth
father said, “We love our daughter very, very much. And she needs to stay here.
She needs to stay where her home is.” "She's so happy." “The
foster parents are amazing. They’re wonderful people,” the birth father added.
“I wish they were my own parents in some ways.” ---- Tomorrow an incisive response from Ray Ferris.
The
two-year old girl's foster parents are petitioning B.C. Supreme Court to allow
them to adopt the child, and are arguing girl has already formed a strong
emotional bond with them. The government contests this bid by arguing that it’s
an abuse of the court process because another judge already sided with the
ministry last year. The foster family’s lawyer, Jack Hittrich, said the new
petition must be considered because it includes an unheard argument over S.S.’s
constitutional rights. Hittrich is asking a B.C. Supreme Court judge for an interim order to
keep the girl in the care of the foster parents until a full hearing on their
petition can be held later this year. Hittrich told the judge this past Friday
that moving the girl across the country, and then possibly moving her back if
the petition is successful, would harm her emotionally and mentally. “There’s
overwhelming evidence before you that the disruption of the status quo, pending
the full hearing of the current petition, is simply not in the best interests
of this little girl,” he said.
The
foster mom says she knew the Ministry intended to move the infant girl to
Ontario, but says the MCFD took to long, and now in two years, the girl has
bonded with them and the biological parents. She says, “It’s been mishandled and the child should
not be the one who suffers. This has never been about us, this has always been
about the child.”
“Allowing a move to parents she has never met,
who are truly strangers to her ... and then moving her back, if the relief on
appeal or the petition is successful, could be even more harmful to her.”
Keith
Henry, president of the B.C. Metis Federation, said the Metis community was
never consulted in a meaningful way in the case, and that his organization
wants to see the child stay.
“This
girl must not be moved,” Henry said. “To put [her] with a non-Metis family is
absolutely a non-starter in our community.”
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